Hopper, Dump O/O's & Drivers

yes doonan

 

Hope everyone has a profitable new year

 

Welcome grain pups,look forward to reading your post. What kinda rig do you yank them pups around with?

 

bought a 98 fld 120. day cab 500 detroit, 13 sp ,single axle 650,ooo miles pulled one tank off got it at 13,000 lbs full of fuel

 

now I have been wandering about super singles. someone told me you loose 320lbs per axle weight savings but with pups I worry about a blow out.what do you guys know about them?

 

What's that make your tare weight with the whole rig? For me, the possible problems with singles outweigh the benefits. Our stuff is on low pro 22's, there's not a big difference between a pair of them on alum rims and singles. At least when we eventually afford to get alum rims on the inside duals also....

 

There's way to many aluminum rims sitting on trucks that have been sitting in the weeds for years. Poke around enough and you can find a set for a song.

 

i have alum 22.5 on now. I was told super singles would still save me 300 pounds per axle. so my understanding from you guys thats bogus! right?

 

No, 300# for 2 axles maybe but not 300 each. A 22.5 Alcoa weighs 45.5#(70# for steel), 24.5 is 56# (steel is 86#) and a 14" wide base weighs 62#.

X-One Michelin XDN2 445/50R22.5 which is the same size as a LP22.5 weighs 182.1#
A XDN2 275/80R22.5 weighs 125.7

Pick whatever tire you wish I only used these the XDN2 as an example.
So 8 LP22.5's on alum wheels weighs 1369.6#
and 4 X-Ones on alum wheels weighs 976.4# which is 393.2 # in savings.

Just dumping all steel wheels on the tractor only for all alum you will save ~196# not including never painting again.

What you will save all depends on what your truck has now. If you have steel 24.5's then of course you'll see the biggest benefit. We swapped 2 trucks and 2 trailers over to x-ones but they were already as light as possible so they see the added benefit. If you don't need the heavy drive lug tires there's almost 20# difference in tire weight if you can get by with hwy tread. One drawback other than the obvious cost and flat tire issue is the load capacity. Most are only rated for 10,200 per tire where 16ply 22.5 duals are good for 13,220#. Not really an issue unless you haul heavy.

Grain hoppers are probably see the biggest benefit from x-ones because they actually load to max weight where a typical dry van probably isn't going to be adding another pallet because they were 700# lighter.

 

Thanks to jfaulk for showing the math, he's correct - you will not save 300# per axle unless you've got the heaviest wheels and tires on the planet. I looked into running singles on a hopper last year, but being stranded on the shoulder over a tire seemed like a bad risk to take. Add to that the cost of a super single wheel you'd wreck from landing on it ($800) and you've just seen the most expensive blowout in history.

Large companies that run singles apparently don't care about the risk of a blowout, and probably get fleet pricing we could only dream about. I decided against it, and I'm glad I did. A few months later I had a blowout on the trailer, and had to drive over a mile to get out of traffic near Boston. The inside wheel and tire looked like a hippity hop carrying all that weight, but it held and made it safely. A super single would've had me parked right where it happened obstructing traffic.